In this post: Constellations, a rocket ship, and creating a dream island.
Hello, dear ones! I hope you are well. My best friend just had twins and I'm super excited for her. It's hard to believe that almost 18 months ago I was in her shoes....kind of. She has three older kids to homeschool while taking care of newborn twins...so not exactly. She is amazing! Still, when I started 5th grade for Michael, Leeland was 5 months old. We finished up 4th grade and had a restful Summer. 4th grade had to have been our most boring grade. I was pregnant and we barely got by. I wanted to do better for 5th grade, but homeschooling with a baby had its challenges.
Now Michael is a 6th grader (a preteen!) and Leeland is a very active toddler. Lord willing, you will get to see how I homeschool with both a baby and a toddler side by side. It's like you get to jump forward in time. For now, though, let's jump back to 2015 when Michael started 5th grade and Leeland was 5 months old. I will share our curriculum for 5th grade as well. You also get to see us go from a homeschool room to our school house. We were still using the homeschool room in this post.
First day of school: breakfast ~First, Michael started with a big breakfast. You'll recognize the decor from our open house party. I set the planet mat out since we were learning about the planets. The Write-A-Mats are a great way to help kiddos learn facts. It's hard to forget something that you stare at every day.
Michael starts his day with Bible study/devotions. In 5th grade, we used Bob Jones 5th grade Bible Truths. I believe this is the third year we've used Bob Jones and I really like how they include Bible history, hymns, and stories of famous Christians.
We also use Bob Jones English.
I put together journal questions. This was our first year doing a journal. These two weeks Michael wrote a constellation story and what life on the moon would be like. I encouraged him to draw pictures to go with his stories.
Pronouns with the Lite Brite~ The Lite Brite was a fun addition to the mix. We found several educational uses for it.
For spelling, we used Christian Liberty Press 4th and 5th-grade books. We started later on this curriculum so we had to catch up. By the end of the year though, Michael temporarily lost his book so we used www.5thgradespelling.com and I found that he did much better. My other favorite is Spell-U-See but we didn't get to that until 6th grade.
We used Horizons 4th grade book 2 and 5th-grade book 1for math. The second book is always on the next grade level. So we're not actually behind. I've switched my math curriculum for 6th grade, but for elementary school, I do like Horizons. Michael also read Life of Fred books.
Pizza Fractions~ I also used hands-on ideas for several subjects. Here I combined Michael's fraction pizza game with Leeland's clock to teach fractions. Having baby toys around comes in handy!
For 5th grade, I tried to match up science and geography themes. I also chose several of our books to go along with those themes. For example, the next unit we read The Little Princess while learning about London. The Little Princess takes place in a London school. So they went hand in hand. Not all of our books matched up, but most did.
We used Investigating God's World by A Beka and lapbooks for Science.
I've found the A Beka science to be challenging. There's a lot of memorization. Michael loves science but he struggled with these. So for 6th grade we've changed curriculum. I'll let you know how it goes.
For history and geography, we used Lifepac 4th grade. We jumped back a grade because I felt we had jumped forward to world history in 3rd grade. I wanted to make sure we didn't miss any basics. We also did lapbooks on state history. We dug deeper into state studies over the Summer. We did things out of order, but thankfully we can be flexible.
Leeland chilling...
Sun project ~ This is one of our hands-on science projects. I cut a styrofoam ball in half and Michael painted it as he learned about the sun.
Solar System necklace~ We used glow in the dark beads to make this planet necklace extra special. You can find my pinspirations down in the links at the end of this post.
Constellations with the Lite Brite~ I loved this project. I printed out constellation sheets and Michael used the Lite Brite to light them up.
Rocket Ship~ project boards and paint...not hard at all.
Inside the ship
The Feast of Trumpets and a night of Star Gazing
Michael used my star app to aid him.
Dream Island~ We learned about landforms and maps in Geography. So I had Michael design his own dream island. It really became a world. He used salt dough on cardboard and then he painted it.
Salt Dough Recipe here: http://amberdover.com/2012/01/07/cheap-christmas-gift-ideas-crafts-n-such/
For music, we continued with our piano books and we began learning the recorder. During this unit, Michael learned how to play Vivaldi's Autumn and a song called The Planets, on piano.
We use this site for sheet music:
Playing the Recorder
We used the book Art B by A Beka, an art appreciation lapbook, and Pinterest projects for our art this year.
The Art Appreciation lapbook helped us with the elements of art and also famous artists.
The elements of art
We also had lots of fun with our Homeschool group
Lego Day
Puzzles & Mosaics
Random pictures...
Working with the Baby
Chester blending in with the Fall decor
Distracted by a ladybug while working on the trampoline
Thank you for reading and I hope you are inspired! God bless & remember the High King lives! ~Amber Dover
You can find more ideas here:
5th Grade Pinspiration
All of my 5th Grade Posts: